Sorry, I had to go and have a good cry after I wrote that sentence. I would blame the hormones. But there are truly so many emotions behind that sentence. 4 days that have shaped my life more than any others (ok, my wedding day was pretty great too). But those 4 days. Those 4 births. I don’t want to forget a single moment of the anticipation, the pain, the wonder, the joy, and empowerment, the overwhelming love. How your heart just explodes a little more with each new baby you hold in your arms.

Introducing: Juniper Renee Pool. Born on April 13th at 5:27 pm. She weighed 8lbs even and was 19.75” long. The name Juniper is a nod to the long history of plant and landscape lovers on both sides of my family. My great-great grandpa started Hoerr Nursery over 90 years ago and I have fond memories of all the beautiful plants that have special meanings to my different family members (the magnolia tree in my grandma’s yard, my dad’s love of geraniums in our front yard and the ginko and birch trees, my mom’s zinna’s). Renee is my sister, Jenna’s, middle name. She is also the one who took all the beautiful birth pictures below.But let’s back up a bit, shall we? Since I’ve been a terrible blogger for a year now, I need to recap the craziness of this last pregnancy. We had been a little on the fence about adding a number 4 to our clan, especially with new rhythm we were trying to find in our new city of Denver! But in April 2016, we got a positive on a pregnancy test and were thrilled. But in May, we sadly lost that sweet baby. It made me certain we weren’t done adding to our family (William took a little more convincing). Just 2 months later in July, we got pregnant again and after seeing a sweet little heartbeat, announced it to the world in September. We found a wonderful midwifery practice that at the University of Colorado Health, which is a great compromise for William and I. I’m probably a homebirther at heart and William would never do birth outside a hospital, so this practice felt like a great middle ground for us. With this practice, you rotate seeing six midwives and one would be on call for your delivery at University Hospital. I can’t say enough wonderful things about them and how supported I felt through everything this pregnancy has brought. So let’s just sum up this pregnancy in a word: nausea.

I’ve been increasing sick with each pregnancy, but this one was a whole new ball game. Starting around 8 weeks, and extending until the day she was born, I had nausea. Thankfully, the bulk of the actual puking ended around 22 weeks, but the remainder of the pregnancy I still was on the highest dose of 2 different meds to keep food down and help me to function.

Then to make things even more fun, I started to get the sneaking suspicion around 30 weeks that baby was not head down. I pressed for an ultrasound at my next midwife appointment and it was confirmed that she was breech. This launched me into weeks of trying everything and anything in my power to get her to turn. We started seeing a chiropractor weekly and I did every trick on the spinning babies website. My ironing board saw more action that it ever has as I laid head down on the side of my bead twice a day for 20 minutes. I had acupuncture for the first time and burned moxibustion sticks by my pinky toes several times a day. I took warm baths with an ice pack laying on her head to try and get her to move to the warmth.

We also made an appointment with Dr. Hall. He is one of the few doctors left in Denver the country who will allow for a breech vaginal birth. He works at Swedish Hospital, which is about 45 minutes from us, but I wanted to have a back up plan in case she decided not to turn. I had a midwife appointment the day before meeting Dr. Hall and we confirmed that she was still breech. The next morning (Thursday, March 16th @ 35w4d), I was lying in bed and felt a sharp pain but I thought it was because I was huge and also had 2 kids that had snuck into bed with me in the night and getting comfy was beyond me. My car wouldn’t start that morning, but thankfully, my neighbor let me borrow her car and I headed to Swedish. We had an amazing appointment and he said I was the perfect breech vaginal candidate. But then, we did the ultrasound – and she was HEAD DOWN. Wow, did I feel silly. Haha. Her head was very flat and he said he could tell she had just turned. But he gave me his cell phone number and said if she turned back or those midwives weren’t able to help me, just call him.The rest of the pregnancy was all the normal “can’t sleep, can’t eat, I can’t wait until she’s out” routine as she stayed head down and we just anticipated when she would arrive and if it would coincide with my mom being able to fly out. I had about 2 weeks of prodromal labor. For those unfamiliar with that, it’s basically real labor (unlike Braxton hicks contractions) in terms of pain, contractions, and regularity but it comes and goes. It’s more likely to happen in subsequent pregnancies and also pregnancies where the baby isn’t in an optimal position. It made for an exhausting last few weeks and also made me very unsure of how I’d know if I was in labor that was actually worth heading to hospital for.

On Tuesday, April 11 around 2pm I started having contractions that felt very different and very real. At about 1am, I decided we should probably go to the hospital just to see. Well, that was embarrassing. I felt like a first time mom when Nikki pronounced me 1.5 cm and +2 station and sent me home where contractions completely stopped. William decided to stay home from work on Wednesday, just in case. I had contractions all day Wednesday and was having trouble talking through them, so we decided to make our way to the hospital again around 4pm. Annnndddd, sent home again at 2cm. Feeling like a fool at this point, although the midwife was very kind to say that I really WAS in labor, she was just taking her sweet time. I was able to sleep through the night and decided I would not be heading in again until I KNEW it was time. (I was GBS+ again so I knew I needed to get there in time to get IV antibiotics before she arrived).

Thursday morning, I had my regularly scheduled midwife appointment with Nikki. She checked me and gave my membranes a really good strip (holy cow, ow) and said I was now a 4, almost 5 and it felt totally different than I had on Tuesday night. She said she’d be expecting a baby that day! Yay! My mom was scheduled to land at 8pm and now I was just hoping she’d hold off a bit longer so we wouldn’t have to worry about another round of childcare. I was having good contractions all day, but around 3 it started to feel a little more urgent that I call around and see if anyone was around to watch the bigs. My friend Kaylen came over with her little girl Scarlett. I had a grocery order delivered and was trying to help with that but at that point realized “this is really it.” I had her take a picture which is time stamped 3:47pm and I rode in the backseat to the hospital to try and be bit more comfy. My sister decided to just meet us there and my friend Song said she’d make her way there as well.

When I arrived in triage, I was needing William to put pressure on my lower back for contractions and there was definitely no talking happening. They checked and I was at a 7 and they said they were going to hurry up to start getting the pool ready. Woohoo, finally staying and having a baby. They said we’d finish baby’s monitoring upstairs as they wanted to get my IV in right away, so I walked (with a few stops) to room 512! Notice the clock. We arrived in the room around 4:40. Didn’t realize how quick of a stay this would be. At this point, contractions were coming pretty much right on top of one another.They needed a few more minutes of monitoring baby, so here is my last official pregnant belly pic:Then it was IV time. She had a little trouble getting it in the left arm, so I got a second poke on the right. I was supposed to get 2 doses over the course of 4 hours. Spoiler: I got about 3/4 of one dose. 🙂 I was ready for water at this point, but the ladies were still working on the big tub, so they filled the smaller tub in the bathroom for me. I remember William joking that I got my own rubber ducky.William and I have a pretty good routine down now that we’ve done this a few times. He presses hard on my back during contractions but other than that, it’s HANDS OFF. 🙂 I vaguely remember this nurse coming in to take of the monitoring belts and tell me the tub was almost ready. I turned around in this tub at this point and remember becoming more vocal and feeling like I wanted to quit. But then knowing that means I was almost there.At the end of a super hard one, I felt my water broke (sidenote: this is the first time my water has EVER broken on it’s own). William yelled out that it was 5:16. The big tub was finally filled and I somehow was able to get out of the bathroom and into the tub right as another contraction hit. The midwife said there was a little “stool/chair” if I wanted to try to sit back. So I thought, what the heck, I’ll try that.Umm, nope for that position. I needed to push. So push I did. Her head was out quite fast. But her shoulders were turned just slightly and didn’t want to come out without a little help from the midwives.We got my legs back and she helped with the shoulders. And then, she was here. Born at 5:27. About 47 minutes after we arrived in the room. And after about 10 minutes of getting in the birthing tub. Ahhh the sweet relief and joy. She wasn’t making many noises no matter how hard we were rubbing her back and head, so they wanted to get her under the warmer just a bit to get her to pink up. And my placenta was already starting to separate, so I didn’t put up too much of a fight. Of course, she immediately put her lungs to use. William got to cut the cord, while they helped me out of the tub. The minute I stood up, I felt the placenta so I delivered that standing up into the bowl. They brought her right back to me while I got assessed for “damage” and was so thankful that no stitches were necessary! We marveled at her long fingers (just like Ellison’s) and were quite shocked at her full head of hair (I usually have bald babies). She took to nursing like a pro.My dear friend, Song, arrived thinking I’d still be in labor. But instead, she got introduced to the little miss and got an apology that it went so fast and she missed it! 😉 We took a couple family shots.Then, we had them weigh and measure her then so that Jenna could leave and go watch my kiddos until my mom arrived (I’ll forever give Jenna a hard time that I got her in and out in basically an hour for this birth) 🙂 Juni weighed 8.03 pounds and was 19.75” long.I had found this blanket that had coral peonies on it like in her nursery and little berries that resembled juniper berries. I knew it was a blanket she had to have. The little bonnet I knit the week I found out she was a girl. We moved to a postpartum room where we settled in for a longer stay than we anticipated (more on that in a next post). William left to pick up my mom from the airport and when they got home, we facetimed the kids to show them their new sis! Then I settled in for a quiet night of snuggling June bug. I marveled at how in the world I now had 4 kids and thanked God for the amazing birth story that I got the end my “birthing career” onAnd then I may have shed a few tears. As thrilled as I am that I feel that our family is complete, there is a sadness that comes with this finale. That was the final wait for the 2 lines on the pregnancy test. That was the last time I would feel a baby move inside me. The last time I would anticipate knowing if we would have a boy or girl joining our family. The final time I will lovingly craft a coming home outfit and carefully plan a nursery. The last time I time I will anticipate when labor will start or how their story will play out. The last time I will feel the pain, the exhaustion, and then the euphoria of giving birth. This will be last “first night” where I stay up all night watching her breathe, touching her soft skin and marveling at all the newness as I pick her up to nurse in the night. The last time I will write out a story as life changing as having a child.

But that sadness is also mixed with great excitement. Joy about the stages of rearing children that are ahead of us. The new things well be able to do once we’re out of the newborn/toddler stage. And just a deep sense of anticipation to see what God has in store for Juniper’s life.

Psalm 127 3-5 (the Message)Don’t you see that children are God’s best gift?the fruit of the womb his generous legacy?Like a warrior’s fistful of arrowsare the children of a vigorous youth.Oh, how blessed are you parents,with your quivers full of children!

While I am so deeply excited for our next family adventure, in this last night in our house I’m letting the sadness creep in for a bit. It starting to hit that tomorrow is the last time I’ll wake up in this sweet little town where I’ve been born and raised. I will no longer get to drive by the little house on New Street where I was born. Or send my kids to the schools where I roamed the halls. I won’t see a football game on the field where I cheered or go every week to the church that shaped me and where I walked down the aisle to my love. This beautiful house where I brought my babies home is not the home I’ll grow old in. My wonderful momma friendships are about to change to seeing their babies grow up only through social media. My own mom and dad are now going to be a plane ride away, not just a quick trip by car.

New beginnings mean the end of lots of things. Things that feel safe and normal right now. And tonight I’ll be a little sad about that.

Amidst the absolute craziness of preparing to move across the country in 6 weeks, I’ve tried to make sure we’ve had playdates scheduled with some of our dearest friends. It make me so sad knowing that there is literally not going to be time to say goodbye to all of the people we hold so dear here. Today, we went to my friend Anne’s house. Anne and I met my freshman year in college and became quick friends! We were super involved with Campus Crusade together, roomed together my junior year, and I did my first overseas trip to visit her while she lived in Germany!After college, we continued to stay in good contact and eventually life brought her to Champaign! We met the loves of our lives and got married in the same summer of 2007 and were in each other’s weddings!We met each other’s first baby’s and continued our friendship into our journey of motherhood.

meeting Baby Grace

Anne and Grace meeting Baby Owen

Our families grew and so did our relationship. She made amazing quilts for each one of my kiddos. I’m not sure she’ll ever know how much I treasure these. Like – in case of a fire, these are on the list to grab. haha

In these last few years, we get together every 6ish week and talk all things church, family, routines, homeschooling, and just life! We’ve added 4 more kiddos to the clan bringing the total to 6 and it just keeps getting louder and more fun with each playdate. I cannot put into words how much I’m going to miss our in-person relationship. While I know we’re friends for life, seeing these last pictures of our crew together makes my heart ache knowing our kiddos won’t grow up close like I had once envisioned. I could not be more excited though that they will be our first Illinois visitors this summer and I might already be counting down the months days! Love you Anne, Grace, Caleb, Eliza (oh and Matt). 🙂

But they do mean that I have been blessed with amazing friendships. Let me back up on this one. In July 2012, I decided that I wanted to try and find a family that needed care for 1 or 2 kiddos a few days a week. It would allow me to stay home with Owen and Ellie, but bring in just a little extra income. I posted an ad on several places and even on Craigslist. Little did I expect that one gal would respond to my ad (something that I know now is very uncharacteristic of her) and it would be the start of a beautiful friendship. Carrie emailed me and asked if our families could meet. It was love at first meet for us and that fall, I started watching Sam 2 days a week for her while she worked at the U of I. These boys had a fast and fearsome friendship. Sam was a childcare person’s dream and it was really just like he was a part of our family on the days he was with us. I am still having a hard time believing that they were both using paci’s and in diapers when our families met.

our first day watching Sam

These boys have spent hours and hours together, playing cars, exploring outside, and having pool time in our backyard:They have truly just had the best time at being best buds. On his 4th birthday, Sam’s family came and got Owen and took him to the movies!

They have grown up together – from those little babes into Lego loving BOYS. And while our relationship started out of need for childcare, it has grown into so much more than that.

Every summer, we’ve made a tradition to celebrate the 4th of July together as families!

And that brings us to today. Probably the last day we will see these guys for a long time. We have loved making road trips down to their little town and hanging out with Sam, his brother Jack, and let’s not forget their sweet dog Bosley.

the adorable crew – Jack, Ellie, Sam, Owen, and Miles

they all adore this sweet dog!

Carrie and I (well and Sam and Jack too haha)

last group hug!

Carrie, I am going to miss our in-person friendship so much. I love your calm, sweet spirit and am truly envious of your always-clean-and-organized house. I know we’ll stay in touch but I hope it’s not too many years before we hug in person again. Love you and miss you already!

William’s job has always been a source of stress in our marriage. He worked in Houston in a huge architecture firm before moving to Champaign for graduate school. His plan was always to go back to the big city…but he met me and “got stuck” as he sometimes says. He’s bounced from small firm to small firm as we have moved cities been laid off due to a company’s lack of funds and he’s never been super – well – happy. And any married woman knows how much a man’s job really does affect EVERYTHING in a family. When we lived in Indiana, he decided to try and study and take his NCARB licensing exams. There are 7. I know right, he’s not a doctor, right?! But 7 exams it is. He can practice architecture in a firm without being licensed, but if he ever wanted to get into a bigger firm or practice on his own, he has to be licensed. He took 2 and didn’t pass and lost steam.

Well, fast forward to the fall of 2014. He felt like it might be time to start studying and trying again. While he loved the people he worked with and his boss who has been so good to us, he was growing increasingly frustrated with the lack of career opportunity he was going to be given at his firm. And frankly, at any firm in Champaign/Urbana. There was another gal, Whitney, in his office who also decided to start studying for the exams. So a partnership was formed. They made plans, studied at home separately and then talked at work and lunch about what they were learning. I think this was the KEY to the success they had in taking the tests. William wasn’t just sitting reading by himself, he had to learn it and reteach it. They took their first exam in October and both passed. The decided to change nothing about their process. The continued to study for about 6-8 weeks and then take a test. And little by little, they passed EACH ONE! It was not an easy year, let me tell you. We’d see him for dinner and a little of bedtime, and then he’d disappear into the basement. They gave 6-8 hours on the weekends as well. But seeing all those passes made every “single mom” moment worth it!

We both had agreed that when the time came, he would start his job hunt in Denver. If I have to move to a big city, it just made sense with the amount of family I have there. So he sent out a first round of resumes. We worked on his website (http://williamepool.squarespace.com) and then waited. He got a response from Craine Architecture pretty quickly and we got excited! He had 2 phone interviews that seemed to go really well.

But then we didn’t hear anything. Christmas rolled around. Then New Years. We thought it was done, so he started gearing up for another round of resumes and started looking around Austin. But out of the blue, he finally got an apologetic email that the guy had been busy with holidays and traveling and was still very interested in William. He was officially offered a position on Wednesday, January 20th and we accepted the offer that Friday.

I think I always knew in theory that we would move. But for it to be real is so overwhelming/exciting/sad/scary/every emotion you can think of. It had set a chain of events into motion that is not going to slow down anytime soon. House cleaning/purging, getting it on the market, visiting Denver, finding where to live. Do we rent or buy? How far away from William’s job can we handle? Do we want more space in a home and yard or more time with him? How do you research schools from far away? Can we see all the doctors/dentists/hair stylists one more time before we go? How do you possibly say goodbye to all your dear friends in literally 6 weeks?

We are so VERY sure that this is a God thing. But it’s still very surreal right now and I’m sure it won’t really hit me until I’m looking out my windows at mountains and not corn fields.

We have been doing classes a the Champaign School of Music for awhile off and on. Their Music Together classes are fun for little ones. We’ve decided to let the kids do ONE activity per season for right now. I don’t think there’s reason for them to do more than that, especially as I know it’s going to just get more crazy as they get older. For this spring/summer, we threw out all kinds of sports option to Owen – tball, soccer, swimming lessons, martial arts, etc. Nothing. Refused every one. So I started looking into other things for him and we found the Music Explorers class at CSM. It’s a 45 minute class where they learn the very basics beginning skills on piano (keyboards) and ukulele. He got to pick out a ukulele (red was his choice) and got all his books on the first night of class. He was in love.They spend the first 5-10 minutes singing a welcome song and things like that. Then they practice the ukulele with Mr. Luke. This includes things like learning the string names, how to hold the ukulele, how to pluck the right string, etc.Then, they get to do piano with Ms. Danielle. Basic key recognition, learning soft and quiet, very simple songs, etc.I will say that I’m not sure the instructors have had a ton of experience teaching small children and there’s been at least one child with some behavior issues in both of his sessions. And the price is a little steep. Buuuuttt the child loves it and refuses to try anything else. So we’re going to keep going for awhile. Now if I could just get him to practice. 😉

I cannot wait to give you a full rundown of the amazing party we threw to celebrate my 5,3,1 kiddos. But before the full show of pictures, I have to share a few of my favorite projects from the party. Has anyone noticed that these circus marquee letters are everywhere in decor these days? I’ve seen them in so many stores, from Hobby Lobby to Target. I knew I HAD to have these but when I started hunting around, the lowest price I was seeing was still upwards of $15 for EACH letter. Yeah, not going to happen. So I did what any good crafter would do and started scouring Pinterest for good ways to make them on the cheap. I found a few blogs out there (here and here) but the costs were still a bit high using the paper mache letters or wood. Then I started finding a few that used cardboard. (here) Bingo. My kind of price.
So here’s what you need:

2-3 sheets of posterboard in the color you want

2 sheets of foam board (walmart even carries it). Great if it’s in the color you need, but just paint it if it’s not.

acrylic paint (see above)

hot glue gun

something sharp like a pencil to create the holes

1 string of Christmas lights (I used a 150 light strand I think)

Step 1
Some people can freehand letters. Not this girl. I used my Silhouette software to print out large letters over 4 sheets of paper. You can also do this in excel or photoshop. I used the free font Budmo found here and used text size 1500. Print the parts of the large letter, cut them out and tape them together. Then trace them onto your foam board and cut those out. I needed to use an exacto knife to cut through the foam board.Continue Reading

Is it weird I almost started crying as I sat down to write? It’s like seeing an old friend who you haven’t seen in years. So much has happened. Where do you start? And yet, it feels like no time has passed and the friendship just carries on. Or at least I hope that’s how you feel about my little place in the blog land. I’m hoping you won’t mind that I took some time off.

I thought I’d be ok just closing down the blogging chapter of my life. It’s easier just LIVING with 3 kids instead of always writing about how we’re living.

But I cannot even count the number of times in my head I’ve said “wow, I should blog about this.” I’ve missed the outlet this little site has given me to share what God’s doing in our lives, how awesome I think my little family is, and the ways that I’ve been using the creative bent that God’s given me.

For a year or so, I’ve been listening to my firstborn and wondering, just wondering, about a few of the sounds he makes. Now being an early childhood educator, I knew I was probably being a little over-curious. But this past spring, I called Unit 4 and requested a speech evaluation. Finally, a few months later I got a call saying his eval would be August 12.

I took Ellie to a friend’s house because I knew they’d get nothing accomplished with her there. 😉 We headed to the Early Childhood Center where we met Maureen, a very sweet speech pathologist. She explained they would do the whole early childhood evaluation, as many times they get parents worried about “speech” but there are many other issues that are revealed in the screening.

Owen didn’t want to go in alone, so I sat outside the open door which was nice because I wanted to see what she did anyways. She asked Owen to do a series of things like stack 9 blocks, draw lines and shapes, and describe objects she laid out on the table. He had fun doing most of them, as witnessed by his hands in the air here:She said (later) that she won’t ever forget Owen because of what he did during one portion of the “test.” He was asked to look at 2 pictures and then she turned them over. Then she held up a matching picture and he was to tell her where to lay it down so it would be on top of it’s matching card. Does that make sense? Well, he did the 2 cards just fine. But then she did it with 3 cards, a house, a duck, and cup. He placed the first one fine, but looked confused about the second. He pointed at where to lay it down and then looked at the cards (which were turned over). He said “that one is wrong.” She asked him how he knew that since they hadn’t turned them over yet and he said “the numbers don’t match on the back.” We both laughed! She said she’d never had a kid pick up on the fact that they were labeled with numbers (for her benefit) on the back before. But of course, she still had to dock him that point even though he showed a higher level thinking skill. (boo to standardized tests)

Overall, he passed with flying colors and she said he an absolute joy to work with. She did hear the 3 sounds I was worried about, so I wasn’t a complete nutcase for requesting a screening. He replaces his /th/ sound with a /y/ sound. For example, instead of this, it sounds like yis. He also has trouble with a /r/ sound when it’s in a blend. For example, in crayons, it sounds more like cwayons. And lastly he struggles a bit with the /l/ sound. It sounds more like a /w/ or /y/.For example glasses sounds likes gwasses and leaf sounds like yeaf.She said she never does speech therapy for the /th/sound because it almost always corrects itself. And for the /r/ and /l/, she said it is totally normal at his age. I’m supposed to just model over and over and she even suggested using a mirror so he can see what it looks like to make those sounds. So we’ll just work a little on those sounds extra hard as we start preschool here in a few weeks! It was an interesting experience to be on the other side of the teacher table for the first time. 🙂 Glad to know that on paper, he’s right where he needs to be!

Awhile back, I hosted a Prep.Freeze.Cook party with some friends. It was super fun, but at about $12 a meal, not something my budget could do every month. Enter: my friend Amy. She decided to take the concept and adapt it for a smaller group of friends and do the shopping/prep ourselves. This month I invited myself to her house for the “party.” 🙂 William held down the fort and Miles and I headed over on Saturday morning.How it worked was a week before the party, Amy sent us an email with different shopping lists divided up. We each picked a list to buy. It also had a few items that needed to be prepped ahead of the cooking day. Here’s what my list looked like:SHOPPING LIST E

PREP ITEM – 32 medium sliced green peppers

64 oz white vinegar

4 bottles (16 oz each) zesty Italian dressing

8 limes

7 jars (4.5 oz each) or 28 oz of minced garlic

1 bottle (12 oz) of ketchup

64 freezer bags

8 cans pinto beans, rinsed and drained

8 cans black beans, drained

I also decided to pre-label all the bags to save us some time on the morning of

Every arrived and unloaded all their goodies.These 2 guys were adorable together and were so great throughout the morning.

Again, each group of ladies tackled one meal at a time. We simply found the indreitent on the massive table of food and dumped it into a gallon freezer bag. Once all the bags for that meal were done, we sealed them and put one meal in each lady’s laundry basket.

Here was our list of the 10 meals that we prepped (can you tell we’re big chicken fans?):
Taco Chili
Black Bean Chicken
Meatballs
Coconut Lime Chicken
White Chicken Chili
Chicken cacciatore
Creamy Italian Chicken
Italian Buffalo Chicken
Crock Pot Aloha Chicken
Crock Pot Philly Cheese ChickenAll in all, it took us only about an hour and half for everything. And even better, the total was $89.52 for all of it! Definitely worth doing a little of our own prep work to get our cost down.Amy has a full run down of the meals with links to the recipes. I can’t wait to make this a monthly (or bi-monthly) tradition!

Hello and welcome to my blog and shop! I am Emily, a 30 something kindergarten teacher turned stay at home mommy. I have a hunky husband William and four amazing kiddos, Owen (7), Ellison (5), Miles (3), and Juniper (brand new). I love Jesus and enjoy blogging about my little family, my crafty adventures, and learning how to be a small town girl in a new huge city.